by Tim Green
But the house wasn’t his only concern. He wanted to locate and assess what he knew would be the first perimeter of security. What he found confirmed his recollections of the property that he had previously only seen from the water. The judge’s mansion was a point of interest for out-of-town summer guests during leisurely boat tours around the lake. So he had already seen the cobblestone wall that ran down to the lake and suspected that it completely encircled the property. As he walked its length, he knew that the first perimeter would be a ring of men just outside the wall, with another handful patrolling the water’s edge. Besides the front gate, there were two other walk-through gates, one to the north and one to the south, decorative wrought-iron doors guarding the arched openings in the eight-foot stone wall.
The second perimeter would be inside the wall and just outside the rough ring of trees surrounding the house. As Kurt circled the mansion, he imagined the concentration of men who would be stationed in the front where the driveway curved its way through the trees from the immense wrought-iron gates that led to the road. His own experience as an advance agent in protection was so intense that it all came back to him as if he’d done the job only last week. He knew where the men would go, he saw the inherent weaknesses in the layout, and he knew exactly how they would communicate to their counterparts if something or someone breached their perimeter.
The third perimeter would be just outside the house itself, with agents covering every possible point of entry—a difficult cordon to penetrate, but not out of the question. The conundrum, of course, was the fourth perimeter. That would be inside the house. The fourth perimeter would be comprised of the agents immediately surrounding the president. They were the true bodyguards. In time of need, they were expected to give up their lives to protect him, and they hovered constantly about the rooms where the president sat, or ate, or slept.
Kurt bit down on his lip at the thought of his own son, who at times had been a part of that fourth perimeter. The boy who only wanted to be honorable and do good things for his fellow man and had sworn to give his life for the president. And in the end, he had given it, but not for the reasons he was supposed to. His life had been snatched away by the very man he would have died to protect. Kurt flushed the bitterness in his mind. But this was no time for painful contemplation. This was a time for objective assessment. He let the thought go and focused his attention on the house.
He wanted to get a feel for the layout. Later he would discreetly obtain the plans from the town hall and peruse them in detail. He’d seen the renovation work going on last summer at the judge’s mansion and he knew that it required a filing of updated plans of the house’s interior with the building inspector: public documents. He circled the house in the rain-soaked gloom of the light that oozed from the handful of glowing yellow windows.
Moving with feline caution, he scanned his path for the kind of security that the dead woman from the Secret Service had installed around her Maryland trailer. Kurt doubted a paranoid system like that was in place to protect the judge. People came to Skaneateles to get away from security systems. It was a town where people left the keys in their cars and gave out their phone numbers freely, needing to recite only the last four digits.
Kurt stopped beside one of the monstrous oaks, his wet palm against its dripping hoary bark. He shut his eyes and squeezed them gently with his free hand. The idea of penetrating the four perimeters of security that surrounded the president was an overwhelming puzzle. Most people would say it was unsolvable.
But Kurt knew from his business experience that often what appeared to be impossible could be attained with perseverance and intellect. He reminded himself of the story one of his first scientists in the early days of Safe Tech had told him about a group of German engineers during World War Two. The men had been ordered to attain an extra thirty thousand miles’ use from the fan belts in the German army’s personnel carriers without using any more precious and increasingly scarce raw materials. On its face, it was an impossible problem: getting twice the wear out of the same amount of rubber. But the engineers took the time to think about it and brainstorm among themselves until they actually found a solution. By twisting one end of the belt one hundred and eighty degrees before attaching it at the other end they created a Mobius strip. Both sides of the belt would incur the debilitating friction rather than just one, and the life span of the belt would be doubled.
That was what Kurt hoped he could find, some kind of Mobius strip, a brilliant and logical solution to an apparently impossible problem. In the back of his mind, he suspected that a large part of the answer would come from commandeering the Secret Service’s communications. He was fairly confident that was something he could do. He had access to the kind of technology that would enable him to monitor and decipher the interactions between the agents protecting the judge’s home. Sitting innocuously in his fishing boat on the lake, he could easily listen in. Those communications would typically be encrypted and then decrypted as they traveled across the airwaves. But encryption was one of Safe Tech’s businesses. He could solve that with the right box.
A plan began to form in his mind. By eavesdropping on the Secret Service’s internal communications, Kurt could obtain the passwords necessary to override the protocols set up on the perimeters. He could record the various voices coming out of the command post and create a data bank that would enable him to electronically re-create those voices. He also knew that within his own company there existed the technology to override an individual agent’s radio. Kurt could approach a lone agent outside the wall, for instance, override his communication with the command post, and literally clear his way through one of the walk-through gates. The procedure was purely technical and could be resolved with mathematical equations by a trustworthy friend and employee of Kurt’s named Cheng.
What Kurt couldn’t figure out was how he could do what he had to do and get out. Getting in, with his knowledge and the technology available to him, was quite possible. But the fourth perimeter was so tight that it was impossible to penetrate it unnoticed. He could confuse the agents and get into the president’s presence. That he felt confident about. But once he pulled the trigger and the president was dead, he would almost certainly be killed or captured himself. That was the impossible puzzle.
Kurt didn’t want to kill the president at the cost of his own life. He had a strong desire to live, and not just to exist in a jail somewhere. Kurt wanted the life he had described to Jill. Right now, he was thinking about someplace in the Italian hills on the Amalfi coast, maybe in a beautiful villa overlooking the Mediterranean. But unless he came up with a solution, he wouldn’t make it out of the judge’s house alive.
A high-powered rifle came to mind. That was certainly possible. But Kurt knew what he was and what he wasn’t. He was no marksman and he didn’t have time to become one. The chance of a miss was too great. Explosives were unwieldy and subject to discovery, by no means as sure as a point-blank pistol shot. Beyond that, this was an act of revenge so personal that Kurt felt a driving need to look into the president’s eyes at the moment he cast him into hell.
He purposefully wandered the grounds, making mental notes, familiarizing himself with every possible detail—the trees, the gravel paths, the gardens, and the shrubbery where he could best melt into the night. The more comfortable he got, the closer he went to the house, until finally he was crossing the porch, darting in and out of its shadows like a burglar. In one window, he was startled by a black cat staring intelligently out at him from her perch on the back of a sofa. He quickly melted back into the trees, adrenaline coursing through his body like a torrent.
When he caught his breath, disgust set in. He shouldn’t have been so close to the house. Any advance warning that something was amiss could jeopardize the entire presidential visit. If the Service had a hint that even the trace of a conspiracy was afoot, they would change the president’s itinerary altogether.
On the north side of the house was a freestanding
garage that Kurt knew would serve as the command post. He entered it through an unlocked side door and looked around, imagining how in just a few short weeks it would be empty of cars and bustling with men and equipment. This would be the brain that he would somehow have to anesthetize.
An hour after he’d arrived, Kurt made his way back down to the water’s edge. The rain was beginning to thin. His mind moved restlessly over the idea of coming in from the lakeside. But as sexy as it might sound to emerge from the water like some eerie frogman, he knew that getting through the random patrols would not only be a gamble, but would demand the kind of dark commando clothes that wouldn’t serve him when he got closer to the house. To get into the third and fourth perimeters, he would have to walk through disguised as an active agent.
He cast his boat off and let himself drift downwind a way before starting up the little outboard. By the time he chugged into his own boathouse, the rain had stopped. The moon suddenly appeared low in the sky among a bank of tattered clouds, signaling a definite end to the dampness. But his hands were already numb. He puffed into them and tied up the skiff. A shiver escaped from his core and shook his entire frame. He’d been wet for more than two hours, soaked through like a drowned cat, but only now, with the adrenaline gone, did he feel the chill. He walked stiffly in his wet clothes up toward the house and entered through the back of the garage. In the laundry room, he stripped to nothing and was startled when he turned to find a wide-awake Jill standing there, staring at him with her arms crossed.
“Where have you been, Kurt?” she asked. Her tone was calm but insistent and her face was lined with worry.
“Geez, Jill!” he exclaimed, one hand moving instinctively to cover his privates. “You scared the hell out of me. I was— I took a walk. Actually, I took the skiff out on the water.”
“On the water?” she exclaimed, peering out through the rain-tarnished window at the night.
“I— I was thinking,” he said evasively. He felt as foolish as he looked, standing there with nothing on. “I just needed to think.”
“Kurt,” she said patiently, “it’s four in the morning. I know this is hard for you. I can’t imagine. But please, tell me if you go like that. I woke up and I didn’t know what was going on. I don’t care what you do, but could you just tell me?”
Kurt pulled a towel out of the laundry basket and wrapped it around his waist. He closed the gap between them and hugged her warm body to his nearly naked frame. Her long hair spilled across his arms, warming them.
“I’m sorry,” he said, closing his eyes.
And then, without warning, a low guttural moan rose up out of his throat.
“Kurt?” Jill said anxiously. “Are you all right?”
“I have to tell you something,” he whispered hoarsely, his eyes still shut. “You have to know that this is all my fault . . .”
“Kurt?” she said dubiously.
“Listen,” he hissed through gritted teeth. He reached up and grabbed two handfuls of his own hair. “It was me who had him go into the Service. It was me! Don’t you see?” His voice was laden with anguish and nearly hysterical. “When he graduated from college, he came to me for advice. To me!
“He said he wanted to follow my footsteps. He said he wanted to come to Safe Tech and learn the business and one day earn the right to take over.
“To earn it.” Kurt laughed bitterly, his eyes flashed at her to see if she understood. “That was Collin. He meant it. He didn’t want anything given to him. He wanted to work and deserve everything he got. He wasn’t a spoiled rich kid. And I took advantage of that! I killed him! Don’t you see? It was me who suggested he join the Service! It was me all along, and now—now he’s dead!”
He made the same strange noise again, an agonizing moan that instead of growing louder was somehow strangled into a low gurgle, until finally he was silent. Kurt drew long deep breaths of air, as if he’d just finished a run.
“I’m sorry,” he said in a hushed voice, holding her close to him again.
Jill held him back. After a time, she whispered, “I’m scared Kurt. I don’t know what’s happening, but I’m scared.”
CHAPTER 12
Jill never went back to sleep. Kurt passed out in her arms, his body’s temperature finally climbing to equal her own. When his breathing was deep and comfortable, she slipped out of bed and dressed for a workout. She’d always been an early riser. As a young girl she was on a swim team, and their practices started before school in the dark hours of the day. But even on weekends, even after a long night, she typically rose before the sun. And, maybe because of her swimming past, she liked to get her workout in then as well.
One of the great pleasures Jill had when they came to Skaneateles was to ride her bike. She liked to ride around the lake even though it took nearly three hours. With Kurt sleeping soundly and having just dropped off, she knew she didn’t even have to hurry. She stretched for ten minutes in the darkness of the broad circular driveway. When she was limber, she laced up her shoes, strapped on her helmet, and set off up the long drive to begin her journey. By the time she made the climb through the woods and reached Route 41A, her legs were burning. She turned south in the dark and set off at a breakneck pace.
After the burning had subsided and her endorphins had kicked in, she began to think. In addition to trying to maintain a permanent size six, this was why she loved to ride or run or swim as much as she did. During a long workout, her mind achieved total clarity.
And so she couldn’t keep from analyzing what had happened over the past seventy-two hours, turning the events over unhurriedly in her mind. She thought about Collin. It was hard to believe he was really gone. She couldn’t even imagine the pain Kurt and Gracie must feel. She knew how badly she herself felt, and she hadn’t even known him that long. But in that short time, Jill knew he was special. In fact, he had made her feel welcome from the beginning.
To introduce Jill to his son, Kurt had planned a weekend at Skaneateles. He had flown Collin and his girlfriend up from Washington. The four of them took a tour of the nearby wine country in the middle of the day on Saturday and then returned to the house for a late afternoon swim. When Kurt swam out to the diving raft, Collin’s girlfriend had excused herself to use the bathroom and Jill found herself alone for the first time with Collin.
“You’re different,” Collin had told her without warning.
Jill had looked at Kurt’s son, then out to Kurt who was swimming steadily toward the raft. A half-finished bottle of wine stood on the small wrought-iron table between them and a large umbrella protected them from the glaring sun.
“Thank you, I guess,” she’d said. Up to that point she had been uneasy with Collin, not because of anything he said or did, but simply because his eyes were the same eyes as the woman whose picture was everywhere throughout Kurt’s home and office.
“You’re welcome,” Collin had said with an easy smile. “It’s a compliment. He’s never acted this way before. You should know that, and I want you to know that I’m glad. I’m really glad . . .”
Jill could remember clearly the endearing congenial look on his face at that moment and she felt tears well in her eyes. A minivan raced by her and distracted her until it disappeared over the next ridge. Then her mind returned to Collin.
When someone like him died young, the sense of injustice was wrenching. But as much as she had loved Collin for himself, she cared for him even more because of how much he meant to Kurt. And now the pain of his death was exacerbated by her empathy for Kurt and even for Gracie. The mask of anguish that had affixed itself on the older woman’s face was so pitiful it made Jill wince just to think about it.
But, while she thought she understood the intensity of emotions Kurt was feeling, she meant what she’d said. She was scared. Kurt had always been a rational person. That was one of the things she loved about him. You always knew what you had with Kurt. He was strong, and sometimes stubborn, but never mercurial, never unpredictable. That had someho
w changed in the last three days, and she was afraid that it went beyond just mourning for his dead son. There was a deadly glint in his eye that Jill feared went beyond simply bringing his son’s killers to justice.
Her attention was suddenly drawn to the opposite side of the lake. She had emerged from a deep dip in the road and mounted a high hill that provided a view that actually made her forget her contemplation. The eastern sky had begun to glow in a crimson wash that extended from one end of the lake to the other. The low ceiling of purple clouds hovered just above the fiery horizon in a dramatic, brooding mass.
The angry blood-red sky somehow filled Jill with foreboding. Kurt had told her he wanted to expose Collin’s killers. But was it possible that he was going to do more than that? Yes, it was possible. She had never seen him respond in a violent way to anything. Kurt always kept his composure. Even in the most contentious meetings, he simply stared at his opponents with an enviable serenity. But that meant nothing. He was a deeply passionate man, and if he believed that someone had killed the only child he had, it wasn’t hard to imagine him wanting them dead.
Jill checked herself. She was thinking too much.
“You’re too smart for your own good,” her father used to complain. “Sometimes a person can be so smart, they’re stupid.”
Her father hadn’t meant what he said to sound as scathing as it might to someone who didn’t know him. But he was a relatively simple man, not in his intellect, but in his way of life. He ran a bakery in Merrick on Long Island. Jill’s parents had a tiny house near the train tracks not far from the town’s center. Her father was an immigrant from Hungary, and despite having come to America when he was a young boy, he revered many of the old country’s chauvinistic ways. Jill knew other girls whose fathers were also first-generation Americans, but who encouraged their daughters to excel in school.
